Nebraska governor tells local officials they can't require face masks if they want federal coronavirus-relief funding

Ricketts, a Republican, made the statement on Monday, the same day he set as the deadline for county courthouses and offices to be opened while encouraging but not requiring the use of face masks.

Nebraska has allocated $100 million for reimbursements to local governments for direct expenses incurred in response to the Covid-19 emergency.

"It's really their option, if they don't want to follow the guidelines, they won't be eligible for the CARES Act money but that's certainly their prerogative to do that," said Ricketts on Monday at his daily coronavirus briefing.

A study out last week found that wearing a mask is the most effective way to stop person-to-person spread of the virus which is mainly via airborne transmission, according to the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

In late May, Ricketts issued guidance for how the state's 93 courthouses and offices would reopen that included specific directions that "customers may be encouraged to wear face coverings, but may not be refused service for failure to do so."

The May guidelines however did allow counties to require social distancing and disinfecting procedures.

Larry Dix, Executive Director of the Nebraska Association of County Officials, told CNN that when the guidance was handed down it was immediately met with pushback especially as counties have been impacted at varying levels by the pandemic.

"We had questioned it especially because some of our counties had a significant occurrence in positive tests of Covid-19," Dix said. Dakota County, the location of a Tyson meatpacking plant, and Lancaster County have been some of the hardest hit, Dix noted.

Dakota County's meat processing plant became the site of an outbreak back in May. At one point the cases from workers in the state's meat processing industry accounted for more than 25% of the total cases in Nebraska.

As of Friday, for the last 14 days, Lancaster County has the second highest number of positive coronavirus tests at 289 and Dakota has the sixth highest at 44, according to state health department data.

The guidance by Ricketts also comes at a time where the country is seeing higher rates of new coronavirus cases in many states. Nebraska State Department of Health and Human Services on June 12 announced an uptick of 30 deaths and an increase in cases by 1,320 from the week before.

It is within the guidelines for individual county offices to close if any employee within that office has been exposed to or tested positive for the coronavirus.

Dix also noted that local officials are motivated to comply with the governor's order because the reimbursement funds would then fall on taxpayers to make up if the counties don't get the federal relief funds.

"A number of the counties felt that...if they were to say 'no we're going to wear a mask and we're going to refuse reimbursement,' then it would go on the backs of the property taxpayers. And so they didn't want put this financial burden on the property tax payers," Dix said.

Martin Hohenstein, Chairman of the Dakota County Board of Commissioners, echoed those sentiments, telling CNN that he is in contact with the county health department on a daily basis which gives him closer insight into how well the local residents are dealing with the virus.

Hohenstein, though, was not too disappointed with the guidance saying that he believes Dakota County residents are ready to get back to business as usual.

"I think the more that you can govern at the local level, the people that are here who are experiencing what's going on every day, the more that you can pass that to the local government the better you are," said Hohenstein.